The hill
they had mounted at leisure, in talk with a village priest, dropped
suddenly upon a vague tract of wood and pasture, [59] with a dark
ridge beyond towards the south-west; and the black notch, which broke
its outline against the mellow space of evening light, was the
steeple of the priory of Croix-val, of which reverend body Pierre de
Ronsard, although a layman, was, by special favour of King Charles,
Superior.
Though a formal peace was come, though the primary movers of war had
taken hands or kissed each other, and were exchanging suspicious
courtesies, yet the unquiet temper of war was still abroad
everywhere, with an after-crop of miserable incidents. The
captainless national and mercenary soldiers were become in large
number thieves or beggars, and the peasant's hand sank back to the
tame labour of the plough reluctantly. Relieved a little by the
sentimental humour of the hour, lending, as Ronsard prompted, a
poetic and always amorous interest to everything around him, poor
Gaston's very human soul was vexed nevertheless at the spectacle of
the increased hardness of human life, with certain misgivings from
time to time at the contrast of his own luxurious tranquillity.
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